Shakespeare and the Politics of Commoners: Digesting the New Social History by Chris Fitter

Abstract

 Reviews high time to devote similarly sustained attention to it in the works of Shakespeare’s contemporaries as well. U  W I K Shakespeare and the Politics of Commoners: Digesting the New Social History. Ed. by C F. Oxford: Oxford University Press. . xiv+ pp. £. ISBN ––––. Contrasting the emergent claims of a ‘new social history’ of early modern England with the viewpoint espoused by the leaders and disciples of the older New Historicist approach, Chris Fitter posits that readers of Shakespeare have been largely made ‘oblivious’ to a ‘climate of plebeian political critique and resistance’ (p. ). e agency of England’s commoners has, it is claimed, been barely recognized and little understood in Shakespeare Studies. Drawing upon the work of social and cultural historians such as Keith Wrightson and David Rollison in this ‘new school’ (some of which is almost as old as work in New Historicism, one might add), and noting some exceptions to this rejection of the commoner voice in the Shakespearian criticism of Annabel Patterson, Richard Wilson, Jeffrey S. Doty, and Fitter himself, the Introduction sets out a series of claims for how the ‘affirmations of the new social history’ could help to re-engage scholars with the underserved plebeian class (p. ). e remainder of the volume expands upon Fitter’s own fine work in Radical Shakespeare: Politics and Stagecra in the Early Career (New York: Routledge, ), with several of the contributors offering homages of sorts in commencing their analyses (Andy Wood, Stephen Longstaffe, Jeffrey S. Doty). With eleven chapters and an Aerword—Fitter’s long and erudite Introduction is listed as the first chapter in its own right (and he also contributes a separate chapter)—the volume draws together a relatively small group of distinguished scholars. It certainly feels like a tight-knit project: the scholars more oen than not engage with each other’s previously published work. is is not a point of criticism, but rather a reflection of the fact that relatively few scholars have championed the immanent power of ‘citizens’ and ‘plebeians’, the ‘commons’ and the ‘commonwealth’ (res plebeia), and the notion of ‘popular’ (in the sense of vox populi). Annabel Patterson’s Aerword, which reflects upon the response to, and subsequent scholarship since, the publication of her influential Shakespeare and the Popular Voice (Oxford: Blackwell, ), provides a thoughtful capstone for the project. Each of the essays in the volume serves its purposes perfectly. Peter Lake offers an expert account of the ‘relative and relational’ political agency of the commoners (‘rather than essentializing’) in readings from Richard II and Henry V. David Norbrook writes a splendidly learned and wide-ranging chapter on the plebeian politics of Coriolanus, memorably describing the play as offering a ‘caustically ironic and destabilizing vision’ (p. ). It is a testament to the overall quality of the volume that any of the chapters could be singled out for praise. at noted, MLR, .,   there are some minor points of criticism. In a volume of this kind there is, perhaps reasonably enough, little interest in matters textual or authorial. While Andy Wood and Stephen Longstaffe smartly attend to the problems introduced by the fact that there exist multiple versions of the second Henry VI play, Peter Lake and David Rollison refer only to the First Folio texts. More surprisingly, none of the contributors makes mention of any of the significant body of scholarship on the authorship question regarding the Henry VI plays. Surely it matters for any analysis of ‘Shakespeare’s Cade’ that Shakespeare may not be the primary author of this material? In  Annabel Patterson had rightly noted that the play (in both versions) offers two different rebellions, one led by Suffolk, one led by Cade (who looms large throughout the volume); might it not be of some significance that the author of one section may not be the same as the other? In a more minor quibble, the index runs to a mere two pages; this seems a disservice to such a treasure-trove of content. Overall, this is a rich and rewarding collection that merits and will surely receive serious critical...